“The notion of a tradeoff between redistribution and growth seems deeply embedded in policymakers’ consciousness,” IMF staff wrote. “We should not jump to the conclusion that a treatment for inequality – redistribution — may be worse for growth than the disease itself.”

What might some “equality-enhancing interventions” that support growth look like? The authors pointed to “win-win” policies such as transfers that try to get more kids in developing countries to go to school.

The authors warned readers about drawing conclusions on causality, but said the data signal that “extreme caution about redistribution…is unlikely to be appropriate in many cases.”

“On average, across countries and over time, the things that governments have typically done to redistribute do not seem to have led to bad growth outcomes, unless they were extreme,” the authors wrote. “And the resulting narrowing of inequality helped support faster and more durable growth, apart from ethical, political, or broader social considerations.”